Dispatch from Basel: The Hermes Dressage L'heure Masquee

Too kick off the Style Blog's coverage of the once a year Basel Watch Fair, we picked out this ingenious bit of precision engineering created expressly to, um, not tell you the time. L'Heure masquée, (literally "Time Hidden" ) is a nifty adaptation to the Calibre H1925 movement made entirely in-house (down to the last tiny screw) created by the whizzes at La Montre Hermès, and conceals the hour hand continuously behind the minute hand.

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A monopusher in the crown when activated, fleetingly sends the hour hand to its correct spot on the dial before disappearing again behind the minute hand. This is somewhat ironic—the concealment of time—in a precision machine conceived to monitor and display time. It is feat of engineering that it both a testament to the expertise in-house at Hermès' watchmaking division and the veteran luxury house's sense of playfulness and reputation for thinking outside the box.